


angiportu

by handydandynotebook



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Abortion, Abusive Relationships, Billy Hargrove Being an Asshole, Character Study, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Gen, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Dubious Consent, Internal Conflict, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Non-Explicit Sex, Not Happy, POV Minor Character, Pre-Season/Series 03, Relationship Study, Strained Relationships, Violent Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-10
Updated: 2020-09-10
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:27:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26289475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/handydandynotebook/pseuds/handydandynotebook
Summary: She doesn’t have any friends in Hawkins, acquaintances, sure, but no true friends. Certainly not anyone she could trust with this. The clinic is over an hour outside of Hawkins, so taking a taxi isn’t an option. It would be far too expensive.There is only one person she can think of who could possibly take her and it is the last person who would want to do anything for her. Susan anxiously shifts her weight from foot to foot, scrubbing the dishes in the sink with a sudsy sponge and sneaking looks at her stepson through the window. Incidentally enough, he’s also got a sponge in hand, waxing the Camaro until it shines like a jewel.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove & Susan Hargrove, Neil Hargrove/Susan Hargrove
Comments: 11
Kudos: 47





	angiportu

**Author's Note:**

> so here i am suddenly invested in exploring a character that maybe has all of five minutes of screen time in a show i don't even watch. what even, lmao. 
> 
> comments moderated on this one bc some ppl go fucking cray cray over abortion even in a fictional context and i ain't got time for that. let's repeat that warning in case you missed it in the tags, dead dove: do not eat, do not proceed if abortion squicks you out.

Susan knows in another life, at a different time, and with a different person, this would be cause for celebration. Under different circumstances, she would be so overjoyed, she’d cry tears of happiness. She would print lists of possible names in ballpoint pen and browse cribs in crisp catalog pages and knit warm woolly booties in firetruck red and rubber duck yellow. 

But all she has is here and now, and what she feels is nothing less than dread. 

Dread sinks its teeth into her when she sees the smile drop off Max’s face the moment the front door slams shut, watches Max scurry off to her bedroom while Neil stomps his way to the kitchen and drops the case of beer down so hard the bottles rattle. 

Dread seeps into her soul when she stops squirming and bites into her knuckle, just lets Neil do what he wants, beer breath fanning hot over her face and hands rough on her body, because submitting when he’s in the mood is always easier even if Susan isn’t, even if her skin is crawling like there are grubs and insects hidden just a few layers beneath. 

Her decision is already made the night shouts boom in the garage, muffled by the wall. Neil lumbers in first, brushes past her, goes straight for the fridge. Billy follows behind, split in his brow, red streams trickling into his lashes. When he catches Susan looking, the glare he shoots her is downright murderous and she quickly turns away. 

Susan had already made her decision but it is this that makes her realize it wasn’t really a decision at all. It is this that spurs her to act on what she should’ve known was never actually a choice, to swallow all the sick feelings that rise in her throat like hot bile and schedule the appointment first thing in the morning. 

* * *

The pregnancy is more than enough of a predicament itself, but it isn’t Susan’s only one. She won’t be able to drive herself home after the procedure. Neil can’t know anything about it, let alone take her. She doesn’t have any friends in Hawkins, acquaintances, sure, but no true friends. Certainly not anyone she could trust with this. The clinic is over an hour outside of Hawkins, so taking a taxi isn’t an option. It would be far too expensive. 

There is only one person she can think of who could possibly take her and it is the last person who would want to do anything for her. Susan anxiously shifts her weight from foot to foot, scrubbing the dishes in the sink with a sudsy sponge and sneaking looks at her stepson through the window. Incidentally enough, he’s also got a sponge in hand, waxing the Camaro until it shines like a jewel. 

Billy isn’t ideal but the whole situation is the furthest thing from ideal and he does have a car. Susan could make a call, get him out of class with some excuse the school wouldn’t question and if she timed it right, Neil wouldn’t even have to know he missed. It could work. 

Except for the part where Billy hates her. 

Oh, she knows Billy hates her and she can’t exactly blame him for it. She isn’t the person he needs her to be. She’s not his mother. She’s not even his defender. Now and then, if she thinks she can risk it, she’ll try to reel Neil in before things come to blows. Ply him with smiles or dessert, distract him with some kind of pleasant talk or ego stroking. But most of the time, she just ducks her head or looks away. 

Most of the time, she holds her breath and just waits for it to be over. Sometimes she’s attempted to go to Billy after. But just as quickly as she starts, something always stops her. Fear or shame or some combination. 

How many times had Susan begun to reach out, only to curl her fingers into her palm and draw her hand away instead? 

Too many to count, and she tries even less these days. 

Susan isn’t what Billy needs, not even close. So she can’t blame him for hating her or anyone or _everyone,_ like she swears he does sometimes with all that fire in his eyes. But no one more so than he hates Neil, and maybe that means he would help her out, after all. 

If anyone would understand why Susan can’t have a child with Neil, surely it would be Billy. If anyone would understand what a horrible thing it’d be for Neil to be a father once again, it would have to be Billy. 

Susan watches him through the window and thinks of fresh blood matting his lashes together, thinks of solid fleshy sounds on the other side of the wall, of loud crashes and heavy clatters, and bruises peeking out from beneath the collar of that slick leather jacket. She thinks of those eyes the same blue as the ones in the torn picture of the blonde woman at the beach she can’t let Neil knows she’s seen, how they’re just as pretty but so much harder, hard like Neil’s, and she can’t— she can’t possibly ask Billy for anything. 

* * *

Only she has to, because two days later she still can’t figure another way out of this and there is no other person to ask. 

* * *

Susan hesitantly raps her knuckles on Billy’s bedroom door while Neil is out scrapping metal at the junkyard and Max does her homework in the living room. A few moments pass and there’s no answer, even though she knows he’s there. She probably just didn’t knock hard enough. 

Susan sucks in a breath and knocks again just a little harder. After a few heartbeats the door swings open and Billy fills up the frame. 

“What?” 

“Can I come in for a minute?” Susan asks, keeping her voice low as she glances nervously back down the hall. 

Billy shrugs and shuffles a few steps back, motioning for her entry. Susan shuffles in and quietly shuts the door behind her. Billy stares at her with a mix of annoyance and curiosity as she wrings her hands, trying to get the words out and feeling rather like a cat with a hairball stuck in its throat. 

She’s been preparing herself to ask him this for days but now that she’s actually in front of him, it’s even harder than she thought it was going to be. 

“What?” he repeats, raising a brow. 

“I, um…you see, I have to…” Susan flounders, chest tightening like a clamp. “I-I…” 

She wonders if it would be easier to ask if this was something she wanted to do. If what she wanted mattered at all. 

“Jesus, Susan, spit it out.” Billy impatiently twirls a finger. 

“I have a doctor’s appointment tomorrow,” she mumbles, finally managing to string together a coherent sentence. “I’m…I’m having a procedure done and I don’t think I’ll be able to drive myself home…”

“So not only am I stuck being Max’s chauffeur, but now I’m supposed to be yours too?” he demands, affronted. 

Susan shies away from the rise in volume and nervously gnaws at her thumbnail. 

“Please, Billy. It’s too far to take a cab and Neil can’t take me. Neil can’t know anything about this, actually.” She warily lifts her eyes to his. 

“Why not?” Billy squints at her, lip curled. “You gonna surprise him with a boob job or something? Jealous of the way he’s been eyeing up that busty bimbo across the street?” 

“No, I’m getting an abortion.” 

Susan covers her mouth with her hand as soon as the words have left her lips, like it’s an admission of guilt. Perhaps it is. She was raised Catholic, after all. If her mother were here today, she would be slapped to tears for such a sin. And if her grandmother were here, rest her soul, she’d be kneeling in the corner on raw grains of rice, rosary clasped in her evil, vile, wicked woman hands. 

Billy’s eyes go wide. 

A silence drags out between them. Susan finds herself quaking for reasons she doesn’t especially understand while Billy thumbs at the loops in his jeans. 

“Damn. It’s Neil’s?” 

“Of course it’s Neil’s,” she gasps, mortified. 

“Well if it wasn’t, it’d be your turn to be his punching bag for awhile,” he grunts. “Shit, he’d take a fucking baseball bat to your gut, forget having to bum a ride to some clinic all the way off in…?” 

“Durnsville,” Susan finishes, fixing him with a pleading look. 

“Durnsville,” Billy repeats, blinking at her neutrally. “Alright. You got directions?” 

Susan meekly nods her head. 

“What time you gotta be there?” 

“Eleven.” 

“So I have to drop off Max and then swing back for you. Great.” 

“Please,” Susan murmurs, close to begging. “Please, I’ll p-pay you.” 

“Pay me,” Billy huffs, jerking his head. “You’re really desperate.” 

She is. She is and she can’t be sure if he’s mocking her, reveling in it, or just plainly starting fact. She doesn’t know him well enough to be able to to tell the difference. 

“Sure, Susan,” he grumbles, looking away from her and sweeping the pack of cigarettes off his dresser. “I’ll drive you.” 

Relief washes over her. She swallows thickly and reaches out to pat his shoulder, maybe give it a grateful squeeze, but Billy shifts out of range. For a moment her hand just hovers there, fluttering in the space between them. She haltingly pulls back and knits her fingers together over her chest. 

“I could actually drive there, it’s just, um, coming back that I won’t be able to.” 

“As if I’d ever let you drive my car.” 

No, of course he wouldn’t. He’d never.

“…well, thank you,” Susan says quietly. 

Billy slides a cigarette out of the pack and lights it up even though (or possibly because) Susan can’t stand it when he smokes in the house. He takes a long drag and flicks the ash at her feet. She takes it as her cue to leave. 

* * *

Susan doesn’t sleep a wink the night before. 

After dinner, she straightens up. Scrapes the food off the plates and finds she can’t remember what it tasted like at all. Max takes a shower and Susan doesn’t have to press too hard to brush her hair afterward, wonders if her daughter can sense her stress since such a thing is normally a small argument. Maybe Max can sense her distress, but Neil certainly doesn’t. 

He’s feeling frisky again, seems like he’s been more so than usual lately. Susan wraps her legs around his waist and digs her fingers into the comforter, trying to enjoy it. But all she can really do is go through the motions because her mind is a million miles away from the moment, from the room, from the mattress creaking to the rhythm of the thrusts of his pelvis and the flexing of his hands on her wrists. 

Not too long after Neil rolls off of her, he’s snoring into the pillow and Susan makes her exit on careful tiptoe. She pads to the kitchen and fills a bucket with water nearly hot enough to scald her fingers. Gets down on her hands and knees and scrubs the linoleum inch by square inch. 

Susan wonders what it would be like if she cancelled the appointment. If she stuck it out and gave birth to a little girl. If her new daughter would be rough and tumble like Max is, or dainty as a porcelain doll. If her hair would be dark like Neil’s or copper red. Wonders if Neil would treat her any better than he does Max, or if it’d perhaps be worse. If he’d possibly even hit her as hard he does Billy because maybe being his flesh is the part he thinks gives him the right. Susan feels fairly certain being his flesh wouldn’t protect her from his staunch opinions about women, of shrill shrews and dirty whores and feeble flowers. 

Susan wonders what things would be like if she cancelled the appointment. If she carried a son to term. If he would be rough and tumble like Max, or even rougher and frankly frightening like Billy can be. If his eyes would be soft teddy bear brown or frigid blue, sharp as splintered ice. Wonders if Neil would teach her boy to be a man with pounding fists and screaming matches. Supposes he’d wind up struck eventually, maybe under the guise of being toughened up, or maybe as punishment for bad behavior, but never for taking after the blonde in that picture Neil can’t know she’s seen, the thing she thinks at the end of the day is the source of most of Billy’s scars. 

Susan scrubs the linoleum inch by inch and wonders what Max would think of a new sibling. If she’d be excited. If her eyes would twinkle and her lips would grin. If she would go shopping with Susan for baby clothes or help her pick out a name. If she’d be disappointed because Susan thinks there’s a part of Max that hopes she’ll leave Neil one day, and having his baby would obviously complicate that possibility. 

Susan scrubs the linoleum until the steam rising from the bucket dissipates completely and water that was almost boiling cools to lukewarm. Wonders what Billy would think of a new sibling. If the blood relation would make him more tolerant of it than he is of Max. If he would care about that part at all, if he’d just be exhausted to get saddled with the responsibility of looking after another one of Susan’s spawn. 

Susan scrubs and imagines squishing warm, pudgy baby feet in her hands. Susan scrubs and imagines kissing the top of a ridiculously adorable and bulbous head, sparse hair sweetly tickling against her lips. Susan scrubs and imagines humming gentle lullabies with the loveliest weight cradled in her arms, a tiny fist curled around her index finger. Susan imagines watching Max hold her new sibling for the first time, not quite getting it right and letting Susan gently guide her hands into place. 

Maybe there is another world where having a child fixes everything. Where Neil would look at someone new and perfect and theirs, and melt like chocolate chip ice cream in the sun. Where Neil softens up with a bubbling little one around, stops his tirades and his rants, lays off Billy and never beats him again. Where the monetary stability he provides Susan would be given freely and would no longer be wielded like a weapon or held over her head. Where she wouldn’t be constantly reminded that she is nothing, that she is no one, that he could take it all away if he wanted to, that she has everything she has only so long as Neil chooses to give it to her. 

Maybe that could be this world. 

Susan scrubs and imagines trying to feed an infant as vicious cursing crescendos in the background and something heavy hits the floor. Susan scrubs and imagines Neil holding their baby in a caging grip. Can’t resist wondering if his response to spat up formula would be as volatile as his response when Billy threw up on him two years ago, returning home exceptionally drunk sometime after midnight, so drunk he’d passed out right after and didn’t even seem to feel half of what Neil dished out or remember it the next day. 

Susan scrubs and imagines the first few months of life where their infant will not sleep through the night, where everyone including Neil will be woken up by its cries and she’ll probably never hear the end of it, where he might hold that against her too— getting pregnant later in life and forcing him to go through fatherhood all over again, when both their children are already teenaged and Billy’s just a couple years shy of leaving the house. Worse than holding it against her, maybe he’d hold it against their child.

No, there is no world where having a child fixes anything, let alone Neil. Babies aren’t bandaids, they’re not meant to plaster wounds. Neil is a terribly fearsome father and Susan is a deeply mediocre mother, and it’d be a cruel thing to bring someone new into this situation, someone fragile and helpless at that. 

Susan scrubs until her fingers go numb and dumps the bucket into the sink. A snippet of memory flashes through her mind, bathing a smaller baby Max in a different, also smaller sink. She blinks it away as she watches the murky water swirl down the drain, moving onto the waxing. 

She squirts cleaner all over the floor and waxes it with a sponge mop. Waxes until the linoleum reflects the overhead light with a perfect luster. She doesn’t stop there. She takes the bathroom rugs and slips into the backyard, shaking them out in her nightgown beyond the reach of the streetlamp. 

Susan cannot sleep and so she cleans. 

She replaces the rugs and by this time, the kitchen’s coat of wax is dry, so she climbs on top the counters and washes them down with oil soap and a rag. She polishes them after with lemon-scented spray and putters about the house on pixie light feet so as not to wake anyone, dusting and sweeping and folding all the throw blankets. 

* * *

Susan makes a large breakfast because she’s already awake and she needs something to distract herself with as her anxiety grows. She places three dinner plates of eggs, toast, bacon, and fried potatoes on the table, only has a glass of orange juice for herself. When Neil asks what all this is for, blessedly only bemused and not a bit suspicious, Susan tacks on a fond smile and kisses his cheek while Max cringes in her chair and Billy stabs his fork into the eggs as if they’ve offended him. 

She slinks off to the bathroom and runs the faucet to disguise the sound of her vomiting as has been routine for her the past few weeks. 

Neil gives her temple a kiss and her ass a squeeze before he leaves for work. Susan makes sure Max’s schoolbag is fully packed before she sends her off with Billy. Calls the school the moment the door shuts behind them, says he’ll be absent because he’s sick even though come to think of it, she doesn’t believe she’s ever actually seen Billy sick unless hungover counts. 

She spends some time after preening her hair, looking at herself in the mirror and wondering if the simple cardigan and pinstriped slacks she’d put on is appropriate attire to get an abortion. It’s a strange thought to have and she doesn’t know why she’s had it, there’s no such thing as abortion appropriate attire, and she won’t actually be wearing this outfit by the time it’s…well...happening. 

Susan is getting an abortion. Today. In a few hours. Her grandmother must be rolling over in her grave. Susan can almost feel minute, hard grains digging into her knees. 

She shuts the closet door so she doesn’t have to look at her reflection anymore and scurries back to the living room. Paces around nervously, keeps glancing out the window as she waits for the Camaro to reappear. Double and triple checks her purse to make sure she has everything she might need. 

She briefly wonders if Billy’s decided to snub her. If he changed his mind, if he won’t come back. If he’ll leave her to deal with this mess on her own, alone, just like how Susan leaves him to deal with all his messes. 

But soon enough it pulls into the driveway and Susan just about races out of the house. She scrambles into the passenger’s seat and hastily buckles her seatbelt. Billy watches her with a vague look of irritation. 

“Thank you again,” she says, glancing to him and offering a weak smile. 

“Yeah, yeah, just don’t make it a habit…well, I guess you can’t, right?” he lifts a brow. “You’re like forty. Pretty soon your lady parts are gonna be shriveled up prunes.” 

Susan flinches, stung. She shrinks into herself and bites her lip. 

“This would probably be your last shot if you wanted to pop out another kid, right?” he goes on, absolutely gutting her with the most casual click of his tongue. “Not getting any younger, Susan, womb’s gonna be a tomb before you know it.” 

It stings so much, she wants to smack him. She wants to smack him and she _hates_ herself for it, because it’s without a doubt all the smacking and slapping and shoving and punching and throttling— the belt to his back and the meaty thuds on the other side of the wall —that have made Billy so coarse and abrasive in the first place. She feels her eyes welling up and buries her face in her hands before the sob squeaks out. 

“Are you seriously crying right now?” he scoffs, incredulous. 

And she is but it’s not because Billy’s being Billy without Neil present to rebuke him for it, but because Susan hates the way she feels right now, about herself, about the baby she isn’t going to have, about all the choices she’s made that got her here and the choices she isn’t brave enough to make that could possibly take her somewhere better. 

“I don’t want to do this,” she croaks. “But I can’t have another child. Not now, not with Neil, you know what he’s like—“ 

“Oh, don’t even start,” Billy barks, cutting her off. 

Susan draws a shaky breath and lifts her head, peering at him through watery eyes. 

“Don’t you dare cry about Neil to me,” he growls, low and dark. “Yeah, I know he’s a piece of shit, I’m the one who got stuck with him. But you picked him, Susan, that was your bad call. You wanna bitch about it, you bitch to somebody else.” 

Susan wants to tell Billy she had no idea what the person she picked was actually like until he got comfortable enough to show his teeth. But that’s neither here nor there, and it doesn’t matter anyway. All she has is here and now, dread coiled like a serpent in the pit of her stomach and the overpowering musky smell of Billy’s body spray beginning to give her a headache. 

She thumbs the tears from the corners of her eyes. 

“So how do we get to this place, huh?” 

Susan reaches into her purse and pulls out the folded sheet of yellow notepad paper she’d written the directions on. She unfolds it and silently passes it to Billy. He skims them with his eyes and pulls the car out of the driveway. 

For awhile they ride in silence. Eventually Billy pops in a cassette and the music that rips from the speakers is just as loud and angry as he is. It rampages through Susan’s eardrums, intensifies the headache she’d already gotten from inhaling the fog of his body spray. 

But she never asks him to turn it down. Of course she doesn’t. She only scrunches up against the passenger door as much as she can, tucking inward like a pillbug and trying not to think about the things she thought about last night. Tries not to ruminate in circles about what might’ve been or could’ve been if she wasn’t doing the responsible thing today and ending it before the reality could be turn out to be far worse than any hopeful fantasies. 

Susan finds herself thinking about Billy instead. It’s easy to redirect her attention to him. He’s right next to her. 

She wonders why exactly he agreed to do this for her. If it’s actually for her or if that would be giving herself too much credit. If he’s simply doing it for the sake of ensuring Neil doesn’t have any more children. It could be neither, could be any assorted number of reasons she hasn’t actually thought of. 

She wonders what they were fighting about that night in the garage. Knows Neil shouldn’t have beat him, no matter what it was. Wonders if Billy knew he was going to get beat before he did whatever it was he did that set Neil off, but did it anyway. He rebels sometimes, Susan knows. Never hits back, always cows once Neil actually strikes even if he might backtalk or bait him until that point. 

Billy could probably outmuscle Neil now, probably overpower him if he did dare to hit back. But Susan thinks she understands why he doesn’t, why he can’t. There’s just too much history there. It’s like Susan and her own grandmother. Even when the day came that the old woman was toothpick skinny on her deathbed, drained of life by cancer and frail as frail could be, she was still the authoritarian who had pulled Sinful Susan by the ears and forced her into the corner to kneel on the rice or the corn kernels until she saw fit. She was that woman first, that was the woman she remained to Susan until the day she passed, and Susan imagines it’s probably similar for Billy. 

Susan peeks at Billy sidelong and studies the profile of his face, the sandy curls brushing over the collar of that leather jacket. 

She wants to ask him things sometimes. Like if he misses his mother, if that beautiful blonde on the beach in the picture was as wonderful as the warm smile on her face suggested she was, or if that was just a mask like the one Neil wore for Susan right up until the day he didn’t. If he has any goals in life, if he’s thought about what he wants to do after high school, where he might like to move, because he must want to move, he despises Hawkins. 

Susan wants to ask Billy these things and then she also doesn’t. It’s hard not to be wary around him. He’s huge, he’s mouthy, he gets into trouble, and he doesn’t like her one bit. And what right does she have to try to get to know him, anyway?

She can’t protect him. Not from Neil, not from himself. Even on the infrequent occasions where she tries to protest, she probably doesn’t try as hard as she could because she can’t even fathom standing up to Neil once he gets serious, that dangerous look in his eye. Sometimes that look scares her so much, Susan swears she could soil herself, and sometimes Billy’s look is frightening enough to rival it even under the shield of tears. 

But even when Susan is scared of him, which she is sometimes, she doesn't think she's ever more scared of him than she is scared for him. Susan never feels the hateful burn in her gut for Billy that she feels for Neil, either. She cares about Billy, she really does. Wishes she was more than what she is not just for Max, but for Billy too. 

For all the terror and the trouble, sometimes Susan gets these inexplicable rushes of affection toward him. Like when he indulges Max from time to time, helping her change the wheels on her skateboard or bringing her back comics or candies from trips to the convenience store. Or when he rehearses his dates aloud like a giant doofus, in front of what Susan can only assume is his mirror because he only does this when the door is closed and almost certainly doesn’t realize it’s audible to anyone who happens to be the hallway and there aren’t any other noises to drown it out, like the dishwasher, or radio, or television set. 

“What’re you staring at me for?” Billy shoots her a glance. 

Oh, she cares about him. Cares about him so much, maybe she could’ve even loved him under different circumstances. Could’ve loved him if he’d let her, if she’d ever given him any reason to love her back. 

“I don’t mean to, I was just thinking…I know this whole thing is a big hassle and it doesn’t help that I sprung it on you last minute,” Susan says softly. “It’s so much driving and you had to miss school…but I really appreciate it, Billy. I don’t know what I would’ve done otherwise.” 

Some of the rancor leaks out of his expression. He blinks at her slowly and then turns back to the road. He doesn’t reply. But after a long moment, he turns the knob for the volume down a few notches, almost like he’s sparing her some small mercy. 

Susan supposes she’ll take what she can get. 

* * *

There are protestors gathered on the sidewalk outside the clinic. Not too many, maybe ten in total. Mostly old people and a couple children so young they probably can't even read the signs they're holding up. But they’re all yelling loudly and waving those signs that accuse Susan of being every evil thing she already feels like she is. 

Billy parks and Susan gets out of the car. She has every intention of crossing the parking lot and going inside. But the protestors keep screeching and waving their signs and she just freezes up, pressing back against the Camaro and going still as a statue. Their shouting blasts against her like a biting wind and the words on the signs are like knives in her heart, and Susan swears she can almost see her grandmother standing with them and she simply can’t move at all. 

Suddenly Billy is in front of her. Susan startles. She hadn’t even heard him get out of the car. 

“C’mon.” 

He grabs her by the wrist and pulls her across the parking lot. His hold is firm but it isn’t painful and he marches forward in a determined, unstoppable stride. The protestors won’t swarm Billy like they might’ve swarmed Susan. Billy is much more intimidating than she is. 

He doesn’t let go of Susan until they’re inside the clinic. 

“T-Thank you,” she gasps out. 

“Don't flatter yourself, Mommie Dearest, I just came in for these.” Billy gruffly reaches into the fishbowl on the front desk and seizes a handful of complimentary condoms, ignoring the chagrin on the receptionist’s face. “Gotta keep busy while you’re here for the next four fucking hours.” 

He spins quickly on his heel and stalks out, leaving Susan in the middle of everyone’s stares. She apologies for him when she accepts the clipboard full of paperwork. She fills it out in a seat away from the window. 

The waiting room isn’t too crowded. Mostly teens with frowning guardians in tow and frazzled looking twenty-somethings. The strawberry blonde girl with tearstained cheeks looks about Max’s age, and her mother glowers at Susan in between rubbing her back. 

She wonders if it’s because Billy made something of a scene or if it’s because Susan looks like someone this lady deems shouldn’t be here at all. She's glowering at Susan and maybe thinking she appears much better than off than her own daughter. Susan a mature woman in nice clothes, with a nice purse, wedding ring on her finger. But financial stability is the only kind of stability that exists in the Hargrove household and Susan’s come to realize the price of it is much too high. 

After she turns in her paperwork, Susan is subjected to a series of some of the worst events she’s ever had to endure. She has to listen to the fetal heartbeat and look at the ultrasound and she insists she isn’t going to change her mind, but it’s pointless because these are things they must subject her to by law. 

“Are you sure you want to do this?” 

she is asked, once, twice, three times, and no, no, in fact she knows she doesn’t want to do this at all. Want has nothing to do with this, has nothing to do with anything. When the fuck has Susan ever gotten what she wanted? 

Well, Max. She’s gotten Max. 

Max isn’t the daughter she expected, no. She doesn’t like dresses or barrettes or nail polish, never remotely interested in any kind of beautification like Susan was growing up. Max isn’t demure or soft, never skipped rope or played hopscotch, or let Susan braid her hair. Max isn’t what she expected but she’s everything Susan wanted and she doesn’t think she tells her that enough. 

Susan saws her teeth into her lip and changes out of her nice, nice clothes that Neil was generous enough to buy her unprompted, just because. Isn’t she so lucky that he does that, that he buys her nice clothes and nice jewelry and nice flowers. Isn’t she so lucky that Neil still thinks of her and brings her all these nice, nice things without her asking and still makes love to her in their nice, nice house. 

They dope her up with diazepam and Susan could almost beg for a double dose, almost does, can barely curb the pleas at the edge of her teeth. They dope her up and then it’s happening, some nurse holding her hand. Susan tries to put some stock in the kindness of human contact from this complete stranger even though it’s just protocol like everything else, just a part of her job. Protocol or not, her hand is warm even through the sterile latex of her glove. Distantly, Susan wonders when the last time someone touched Billy this gently was. 

She’s been in his life for years and she’s never seen Billy receive a touch that wasn’t violent, never given him one herself beyond a halfhearted pat on the back here and there that she surely drew away before too long, because Billy recoils from Susan most of the time and often scares her even when he isn't trying to. 

Susan doesn’t feel pain. She feels shame. She feels embarrassment. She feels regret not because what’s happening is happening, but because in another life, it didn’t have to. In a world where she was a better person who made better choices, another child would’ve been a gift.

She thinks of Neil and all the other gifts he gives her, the bouquets and the pearls and the sexy panties he’d actually judge her for wearing if she wasn’t his wife. If she wasn’t _his._

Susan stares at the ceiling and feels not pain but something, some cramping, maybe. She finds that she cannot separate herself from where she is and she cannot separate Neil from it either. 

Neil is deathly allergic to bees. Susan wonders if in another life, she’d be strong enough and hurt enough to hide a buzzing hive in the backseat of his car. Susan wonders if in another life, she might’ve gotten close enough to Billy to be unable to tune out when the beatings start. If the morning after that last night in the garage, that version of herself could’ve poured antifreeze into Neil’s cup of coffee and stomached the results. She wonders if she’d ever be able to go there if Neil hurt Max beyond the belittling and the yelling and the stomping, if Susan could ever find it in herself to be more than what she is should his signature backhand ever strike her daughter’s cheek. 

A stranger holds Susan’s hand and she thinks about these ugly things, and how warped she must be inside to wish she was someone who could do them. She wonders if it makes any difference if Neil is the one who warped her. 

* * *

When Susan stumbles out of the clinic, back in her own clothes, it doesn’t take her long to find Billy in the parking lot. 

There must be a body of water somewhere nearby, because he’s surrounded by seagulls. He’s leaning back against the Camaro and throwing them french fries from a paper fast food bag. She thinks she sees him smirk as two gulls dive for the same fry. 

Susan is so exhausted, she’s dead on her feet. But for a moment she pauses, puts her hand on the railing and just watches Billy toss fries to the gulls. 

_Seagulls are shitbirds,_ she remembers him griping back in California. _Nasty fucking rats with wings._

Susan didn’t care for the cursing but in truth, she’d privately agreed. Yet here he is. Feeding them. Maybe they remind him of home. 

She lets go of the railing and tiredly plods to the car. Some of the seagulls scatter. Billy looks up, fixes her with an unreadable gaze. Susan doesn’t have any idea what to say. Perhaps she’s too tired to say anything. She doesn’t want to him to speak first though, because whatever he says is bound to be something cruel and she can’t handle it. She can’t handle anything else today, she’s already on the verge of breaking down. 

Billy speaks first and surprises her when he doesn’t utter some sarcastic quip or taunt Susan about what she’s just had done. He shifts off the Camaro and stands up straighter, holding the fast food bag out to her. 

“Gotcha some nuggets.” 

Susan wearily blinks at the grease spots and takes it from him feeling a wave of gratitude even though she doesn’t have an appetite at all. 

“Thank you.” 

Billy nods and ducks into the driver’s seat. Susan makes her way into the passenger’s seat. She rolls the bag up and cradles it to her chest and hopes Billy isn’t offended that she doesn’t eat the nuggets. She appreciates the gesture. But she’s fatigued and almost ill and not hungry for anything, let alone greasy chunks of fatty, processed poultry. 

But Billy doesn’t give any indication that he cares at all. Susan reclines in the seat and rests her head facing away from him. She doesn’t think she’s ever been so exhausted in her life. Must be a combination of staying up all night, the stress, the side-effects of the drugs…

She falls asleep. 

She doesn’t mean to but she must, because she doesn’t remember closing her eyes, but when she opens them, she’s facing toward Billy. He’s not wearing his jacket anymore and that’s when Susan becomes aware of the warm weight across her torso and the smokey cigarette smell that wafts into her nostrils as she turns toward it. It takes her brain a minute to wrap around the realization Billy covered her with his jacket and Susan swallows past a knot in her suddenly too dry throat. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to fall asleep…are we almost to Hawkins?” 

“We’re in Hawkins,” Billy says. “Block or two away from picking Max up, actually, you snored through the whole ride back.” 

“Oh my.” Susan's lips part in surprise. She gives herself a bit of a shake, blinking rapidly in an effort to rouse herself. 

“Thanks for drooling all over the seat, by the way.” 

Susan glances down at the patch of dried saliva where her mouth was and winces. “I’ll, um, I’ll clean that up.” 

Billy just grunts. 

Susan pulls the seat back up and sits straighter. Billy's jacket slides into her lap along with the crinkled fast food bag. She tucks the latter between her side and the console, and folds the former into the neatest leather pile she can manage in motion. She nervously fiddles with the zipper after, just to have something to do with her hands. 

When Billy parks at the school, Max comes sprinting up right away. It appears she might’ve been waiting for a bit, like they're late. There’s a look of frustration on her face. It fades, replaced by confusion when she gets close enough to see Susan in the place where she normally sits. 

Max opens the backdoor instead and wiggles into the seat behind Susan. 

“Mom?” She shifts forward and cranes her neck between the front seats, brow furrowing. “What are you doing here?” 

Susan purses her lips as her heart gives a pang, struggling to find an explanation she surely should’ve had prepared beforehand. 

Concern glints in Max’s eyes, her small frown deepening. “Is something wrong?” 

“Your mom had to bail me out of jail again,” Billy interrupts, short and bitter. “Breathe a word about it to Neil and you better believe you’ll be kissing your ride to the arcade goodbye.” 

“Oh.” Max blinks at him and then rocks into the backseat, arms folding over her chest. “Jeez, what’d you do this time?” 

“None of your business.” 

Susan watches Max roll her eyes in the rearview mirror and turns a grateful look toward Billy that he either ignores or simply doesn’t care to acknowledge, gaze cast downward as he absently adjusts the stick shift. 


End file.
